 | Pink HousesJohn (Cougar) Mellencamp |
This post has been moved here. |
DavesMusicDatabase.com is devoted to ranking, rating, and reviewing music of all genres and eras. The DMDB blog serves up album and song reviews, best-of lists, music history snapshots, and music-related essays.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Saturday, October 29, 1983
John Mellencamp “Pink Houses” charted
Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton hit #1 with “Islands in the Stream”
 | Islands in the StreamKenny Rogers & Dolly Parton |
This post has been moved here. |
Sunday, October 23, 1983
John Cougar Mellencamp Uh-Huh released
Uh-Huh |
|
Released: October 23, 1983 Peak: 9 US, 92 UK, 9 CN, 57 AU, 13 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): 3.30 US, -- UK, 3.30 world (includes US and UK) Genre: classic rock |
Tracks:Click on a song title for more details.
Total Running Time: 32:59 |
Rating: 4.127 out of 5.00 (average of 16 ratings)
Quotable:“His first terrific album.” – Stephen Thomas Erlewine, AllMusic.comAwards:(Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Album“Since American Fool illustrated that John Cougar was becoming an actual songwriter, it’s only proper that he reclaimed his actual last name, Mellencamp, for the follow-up, Uh-Huh. After all, now that he had success, he wanted to be taken seriously, and Uh-Huh reflects that in its portraits of brokenhearted life in the Midwest and its rumbling undercurrent of despair. Although his lyrics still have the tendency to be a little too vague, they are more effective here than ever before, as is his music; he might not have changed his style at all – it’s still a fusion of the Stones and Springsteen – except that he now knows how to make it his own.” AM“Uh-Huh runs out of steam toward the end, but the first half…makes the record his first terrific album.” AM The album kicks off with “Crumblin’ Down,” a “dynamic rocker” AM that became Mellencamp’s third top-10 hit. It’s followed by “Pink Houses,” Mellencamp’s “best protest song” AM and another top-10 hit. He also delivers “the melancholy ‘Warmer Place to Sleep’.” AM and “Jackie O,” a songwriting collaboration with John Prine.
The SongsHere’s a breakdown of the individual songs. |
 |
Crumblin’ DownJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp, George Green Released: 10/15/1983 (single), Uh-Huh (1983) B-Side: “Golden Gates” First Charted: 10/7/1983 Peak: 9 BB, 8 CB, 8 GR, 6 RR, 2 AR, 9 CN, 5 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 16.38 streaming About the Song:John Mellencamp kicked off his seventh album, Uh-Huh, with “the dynamic rocker Crumblin’ Down.” AM With its “kidding cynicism” AZ the song became his third top-ten hit on the Billboard Hot 100 after the success of “Hurts So Good” (#2) and “Jack and Diane” from previous album, American Fool.
|
|
|
Pink HousesJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp (see lyrics here) Released: 12/10/1983 (single), 3/17/1984 (B-side of “Authority Song”), Uh-Huh (1983) B-Side: “Serious Business” First Charted: 10/29/1983 Peak: 8 BB, 12 CB, 8 GR, 9 RR, 3 AR, 15 CN, 69 AU, 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- US, -- UK, -- world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 27.50 video, 125.46 streaming |
Awards:(Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Song:John Mellencamp “perfected his angry-young-populist-meets-the-Rolling-Stones sound and persona” DM with “Pink Houses.” He’d struggled to find his sound early in his career before going “back to his Midwestern roots for the American Fool album” TC in 1982. With the #2 hit “Hurts So Good” and the chart-topping “Jack and Diane,” Mellencamp suddenly achieved superstardom.With the follow-up album, Uh-Huh, he chalked up another top-ten, platinum seller buoyed by a couple more top-ten-hits (“Crumblin’ Down” and “Pink Houses”). Mellencamp’s small-town Indiana heartland vibe was coming out even stronger. He “made it all right to be comfortable with middle-class America. He was not complacent, however.” TC He managed to write “a letter-perfect description” DM of “a part of a country long infested by the Ku Klux Klan” DM where “blacks are unknown” DM and “unwelcome.” DM He explained how the song was inspired, saying “I…saw this old man early in the morning, sitting on the porch of his pink shack with a cat in his arms. He waved and I waved back.” TC The result was a song about the American dream and how all Americans have a right to that dream. He took a “stand on behalf of the common man’s aspirations in the face of many obstacles” SS and made it perfectly respectable for the average American to simply dream of finding a place to settle down and call his own, “little pink houses for you and me.” |
 |
Authority SongJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp Released: 3/17/1984 (single), Uh-Huh (1983) B-Side: “Pink Houses” First Charted: 2/18/1984 Peak: 15 BB, 12 CB, 14 GR, 12 RR, 15 AR, 3 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 57.01 streaming |
Awards:(Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Song:John Mellencamp always had a certain brash anti-authority vibe about him and truly embraced it on “Authority Song,” the third single from his Uh-Huh album. It gave him another top-20 hit after he’d had top=10 success with the album’s previous singles “Crumblin’ Down” and “Pink Houses.”
|
Warmer Place to SleepJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp, George Green Released: Uh-Huh (1983) Peak: 38 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 0.67 streaming |
Jackie OJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp, John Prine Released: Uh-Huh (1983) Peak: 32 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 0.60 streaming About the Song:This was a rare songwriting collaboration for John Mellencamp. He wrote the bouncy, quirky “Jackie O” about Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis with help from folk-rock songwriting legend John Prine. |
Play GuitarJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp, Larry Crane, Dan Ross Released: Uh-Huh (1983) First Charted: 2/4/1984 Peak: 28 AR, 3 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 8.55 streaming About the Song:“With his Stonesy band crackling behind him, the newly minted superstar also shows that he gets the joke of his ‘serious business’” AZ on “the garage rocker Play Guitar,” AM “which might have been the album’s fourth hit single if not for its admonition to ‘forget all about that macho shit.’” AZ |
Serious BusinessJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp Released: 12/10/1983 (B-side of “Pink Houses”), Uh-Huh (1983) First Charted: 12/8/1984 Peak: 34 AR, 9 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 0.74 streaming About the Song:It wasn’t a single, but became a minor hit at album rock radio, giving Mellencamp five songs from Uh-Huh to reach that chart. The “serious business” in question is none other than “sex and violence and rock and roll.” |
Lovin’ Mother fo YaJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp Released: Uh-Huh (1983) Peak: 38 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 0.44 streaming |
Golden GatesJohn Cougar Mellencamp |
Writer(s): John Mellencamp Released: 10/15/1983 (B-side of “Crumblin’ Down”), Uh-Huh (1983) Peak: -- Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 0.47 streaming |
Resources/References:
Related DMDB Pages:
First posted 1/20/2009; last updated 2/15/2026. |
Friday, October 21, 1983
Olivia Newton-John “Twist of Fate” released
 | Twist of FateOlivia Newton-John |
Writer(s): Peter Beckett, Steve Kipner (see lyrics here) Released: October 21, 1983 First Charted: November 4, 1983 Peak: 5 US, 5 CB, 4 RR, 57 UK, 4 CN, 4 AU, 1 DF (Click for codes to singles charts.) Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 12.28 video, -- streaming |
Awards:Click on award for more details. 
|
About the Song:As a teenager, my two favorite acts were Styx and Olivia Newton-John – a point reflected when I started doing personal weekly charts in 1982. The next year, Styx’s “Mr. Roboto” became my longest-running #1 (12 weeks) in the roughly ten years I maintained my charts. By year’s end, Olivia came close with “Twist of Fate” logging 10 weeks atop my charts. The only other song to surpass it was 1985’s “Head Over Heels” by Tears for Fears (11 weeks). Over time, “Twist of Fate” hasn’t maintained the same lofty status as “Mr. Roboto” and “Head Over Heels,” which still rank in my top 100 songs of all time. It still appears in my Grand Library (my top 1000 of all time), but has been surpassed by some half-dozen other Olivia songs, including “Physical,” which topped the Billboard Hot 100 for 10 weeks, “Magic” and “Xanadu” from the Xanadu soundtrack (my first cassette), and “Heart Attack,” a #3 hit on Billboard from Olivia’s 1982 greatest-hits set. Because of the monstrous success of 1978’s Grease movie and soundtrack, fans were eager to see stars Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta together again. The 1983 Two of a Kind movie paired the two in a romantic fantasy crime comedy film in which they have to show compassion for one another in order to delay God’s judgment upon Earth. If it sounds like the makings of a flop, it was. The soundtrack, however, was a success, selling a million copies on the strength of the top-5 hit “Twist of Fate” and top-40 hit “Livin’ in Desperate Times." The synthesizer-driven, rock-oriented material was in keeping with the direction Olivia’s music had been going, but it was a long way away from her ‘70s fare which drew much of its appeal from adult-contemporary and country radio listeners. “Twist of Fate” came about when Peter Beckett, who wrote and sang the #1 hit “Baby Come Back” by Player, was writing with Steve Kipner and got a call from Olivia’s manager needing an uptempo song for Two of a Kind. They wrote lyrics to suit the movie, specifically referencing the twist that brings Olivia and John Travolta’s characters back together after their initial meeting. SF Resources:Related Links:
First posted 8/6/2022. |
Friday, October 14, 1983
Cyndi Lauper released She’s So Unusual
| First posted 5/30/2008; updated 11/26/2020. |
She’s So Unusual |
 |
Released: October 14, 1983 Charted: December 24, 1983 Peak: 4 US, 16 UK, 12 CN, 3 AU Sales (in millions): 6.0 US, 0.1 UK, 16.0 world (includes US and UK) Genre: pop |
Tracks: Song Title (Writers) [time] (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts.
Total Running Time: 38:42 |
Rating: 4.114 out of 5.00 (average of 16 ratings)
Quotable: “One of the great new wave/early MTV records.” – Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide Awards: (Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Album: “If Cyndi Lauper’s She’s So Unusual evokes memories dominated mostly by her cartoonish image, then try to get over it so you can pay attention to the music.” BB “The title of Lauper’s debut isn't self-deprecating or even self-parodying; it’s self-congratulatory. Listen to it again, and you'll find this pleasure to be far from guilty.” BB The album is “one of the great new wave/early MTV records,” STE “a giddy mix of self-confidence, effervescent popcraft, unabashed sentimentality, subversiveness, and clever humor. In short, it’s a multifaceted portrait of a multifaceted talent, an artist [who’s] far more clever than her thin, deliberately girly voice would indicate.” STE “Her vocals have an impish quality, but there’s also tremendous strength, articulation, and nuance.” BB This album “captured her persona better than anyone could imagine.” STE It is especially impressive how much Lauper’s personality comes through when one realizes how many of these songs are covers, including All Through the Night (Jules Shear), Money Changes Everything (Bad Brains), When You Were Mine (Prince), and even a song from the 1929s, He’s So Unusual (Helen Kane). Most impressively, however, is how Lauper doesn’t just put her stamp on Robert Hazard’s Girls Just Want to Have Fun, but makes it her defining song. “Lauper’s voice suits her musical persona, since its chirpiness adds depth, or reconfigures the songs whether it’s the call to arms of ‘Girls Just Want to Have Fun’ or the tearjerking Time After Time.” STE The former went top 10 in 19 countries and hit #1 in 10 countries. WK while the latter hit the top ten in 15 countries. WK “Time” has been covered by everyone from Everything But the Girl to Miles Davis, “if you need further proof of her credibility.” BB The front half of the album is dominated by the singles whether it be the “longing” BB “All Through the Night” or “intense” BB She Bop. Lauper became the first female singer to land four top 5 singles from one album on the Billboard Hot 100. WK Unusual “is astonishing in its consistency, so strong that it makes the remaining tracks – all enjoyable, but rather pedestrian – charming by their association with songs so brilliantly alive.” STE “The instrumental arrangements are quite inventive and rich, and although the musicality is pointedly ‘80s, the album sounds more winsome than dated.” BB The only problem is “when a debut captures a personality so well, let alone a personality so tied to its time, the successive work can’t help but pale in comparison. Still, when it’s captured as brightly and brilliantly as it is here, it does result in a debut that retains its potency, long after its production seems a little dated.” STE Not surprisingly, Lauper won the Best New Artist Grammy. She also took home the prize for Best Recording Package and earned nominations for Album of the Year, Record of the Year (“Girls”), Song of the Year (“Time”), and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance (“Girls”). “Girls” was also named Best Female Video of the Year by MTV and was nominated for Video of the Year. Notes: The 2000 reissue adds live versions of “Money Changes Everything,” “She Bop,” and “All Through the Night.” |
Resources and Related Links:
|
Monday, October 3, 1983
Genesis self-titled album released
Genesis |
|
Released: October 3, 1983 Peak: 9 US, 11 UK, 2 CN, 41 AU Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): 4.0 US, 0.6 UK, 10.2 world (includes US and UK) Genre: classic rock |
Tracks:Click on a song title for more details.
Total Running Time: 45:33 The Players:
|
Rating: 3.626 out of 5.00 (average of 18 ratings)
Awards:(Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Album:“If Genesis still had one foot in the art rock world with Abacab, they jumped into pop with both feet on their eponymous release.” AM With their “mid-tempo arrangements designed for pop radio in the 1980s,” AM “the songs are so concise they’re virtually new wave, but still steeped in angst.” BL Then there’s the “crisp, glossy production” AM courtesy of “Police and XTC producer Hugh Padham,” BL in which “the drums go boom and Collins belts hard while simple keyboard hooks are slammed home.” BL The “determined attempt to go pop” BLmeant a “lack of musical innovation that fans had come to expect was a little disappointing.” AM Still, “after years of relative obscurity on this side of the Atlantic, one cannot blame the band, especially one so talented.” AM Besides, even if “they had lost their edge, Genesis still had the ability to craft catchy songs,” AM especially “slower easy listening songs such as That’s All or Taking It All Too Hard.” AM “Genesis still represents the best pop radio of that era, and the album is still recommended for fans looking for 1980s nostalgia or fans of Phil Collins’ solo work.” AM The SongsHere’s a breakdown of each of the individual songs. |
 |
MamaGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford (see lyrics here) Released: single (8/22/1983), Genesis (1983), Turn It on Again – The Hits (compilation, 1999), Platinum Collection (compilation, 2004), Turn It on Again – The Hits (Tour Edition) (compilation, 2007), The Last Domino? (compilation, 2021) Peak: 73 BB, 60 CB, 5 AR, 4 UK, 43 CN, 45 AU, 5 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- US, 0.25 UK, 0.75 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 17.90 video, 62.72 streaming |
Awards:(Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Song:The Genesis album could be characterized as their crossover album. The group has slowly moved from their progressive rock roots in the ‘60s to a more conventional album rock sound by the late ‘70s with songs like “Follow You, Follow Me,” “Turn It on Again,” “Misunderstanding,” and “Abacab.” The Genesis album firmly established the band at rock radio with seven charting songs, including three top-10s.The first of those was “Mama,” a song that was certainly strong and bold, but an interesting choice as a lead single. It certainly wasn’t the kind of song which would storm up the pop charts. It did, however, reach #4 in the UK, the most successful song in the band’s career in their home country. The menacing and eerie song was marked by its “harsh drum machine introduction composed by Mike Rutherford, which leads into minimalist synthesizer lines in a minor tonality and finally Phil Collins’ reverb-laden voice.” WK Some interpreted that song as being about abortion, with the narrator being the voice of a fetus pleading with the pregnant woman not to abort. SF However, Collins based the song on David Niven’s book The Moon’s a Balloon in which a young man falls for a prostitute who is not interested in him. In the song, Collins gives the man an Oedipal complex, meaning he is fixated on referring to the sex worker as “Mama.” SF |
 |
That’s AllGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: single (10/3/1983), Genesis (1983), Turn It on Again – The Hits (compilation, 1999), Platinum Collection (compilation, 2004), Turn It on Again – The Hits (Tour Edition) (compilation, 2007), The Last Domino? (compilation, 2021) Peak: 6 BB, 10 CB, 2 RR, 7 AC, 2 AR, 16 UK, 14 CN, 62 AU, 4 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): 2.0 radio, -- video, 237.04 streaming About the Song:“That’s All” was a first for Genesis – a top-10 hit on the Billboard Hot 100. As a solo artist, Phil Collins had already reached the top 10 in 1982 with his cover of the Supremes’ “You Can’t Hurry Love” and would also find success in early ’84 – even as Genesis was still charting singles – with “Against All Odds” and “Easy Lover.”
|
 |
Home by the SeaGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: single (Australia, 1983), Genesis (1983), Platinum Collection (compilation, 2004), The Last Domino? (compilation, 2021) First Charted: 10/31/1983 Peak: 24 AR, 80 AU, 2 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 42.17 streaming About the Song:While tailor-made for album rock radio this song, along with the instrumental “Second Home by the Sea,” were also a bit of a throwback, showing that Genesis hadn’t completely forgotten their progressive rock roots. |
Second Home by the SeaGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: Genesis (1983), Platinum Collection (compilation, 2004), The Last Domino? (compilation, 2021) Peak: 16 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 8.65 streaming About the Song:See comments for “Second Home by the Sea.” |
 |
Illegal AlienGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: single (1/23/1984), Genesis (1983), Platinum Collection (compilation, 2004), Turn It on Again – The Hits (Tour Edition) (compilation, 2007) First Charted: 1/23/1984 Peak: 44 BB, 49 CB, 21 AR, 46 UK, 41 CN, 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 6.45 streaming |
Awards:(Click on award to learn more).
|
About the Song:“While all the songs [on Genesis] are unbelievable catchy, they often mask inane lyrics,” AM such as on “the surpassingly stupid, Mexican-accented Illegal Alien – where craftsmanship overcomes good sense” BL and “tarnishes the album.” BL The subject matter is a tip-off that some cringeworthy moments might be ahead – and it’s all packaged in an upbeat, “aren’t we having fun?” vibe that betrays any serious message the song intended.
|
 |
Taking It All Too HardGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: single (2/25/1984), Genesis (1983) Peak: 50 BB, 49 CB, 11 AC, 41 AR, 14 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 11.66 streaming About the Song:This ballad seemed like a surefire hit – but Phil Collins’ solo success with “Against All Odds,” released the same month, took attention away from Genesis and “Taking It All Too Hard” didn’t even make the top 40 while “Odds” went all the way to #1. |
Just a Job to DoGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: Genesis (1983) First Charted: 11/5/1983 Peak: 10 AR, 8 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 6.48 streaming About the Song:This was a poppy, made-for-album-rock-radio song, even if the subject matter was about a hitman lamenting the job he had to do. |
Silver RainbowGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: Genesis (1983) Peak: 18 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 3.26 streaming |
It’s Gonna Get BetterGenesis |
Writer(s): Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford Released: Genesis (1983) First Charted: 10/8/1983 Peak: 16 AR, 11 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 4.59 streaming About the Song:In the early ‘80s, album rock radio was the perfect landing spot for an album like Genesis. The album included a mix of pop (“That’s All”) that could easily find a place on the Billboard Hot 100, but also mixed in songs like “Just a Job to Do” and “Home by the Sea” that might not have made it at pop radio but were ideal for the album rock radio format.“It’s Gonna Get Better” lands between the two. It was embraced at album rock radio, reaching #16, but also felt like it could have been a successful pop hit. Alas, it wasn’t meant to be and the song wasn’t released as a single. It may have suffered from the fact that “Taking It All Too Hard,” which seemed tailor-made for top-40 radio, stalled at #50 in the wake of Phil Collins’ explosion as a pop star in his own right. |
Resources and Related Links:
Other Related DMDB Pages:
First posted 3/18/2008; last updated 9/15/2025. |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)